I think minimum wage may not apply to hiring kids to build a fence (I'm not 100% sure). I know for a fact that certain jobs (eg. newspaper deliveries, canvassing, etc) are below the minimum wage.
The thing about minimum wage is that you're assuming that it's a career position, when in truth it's often a passing job on the way to bigger and better things. It's not good when young people have no opportunity to work a low-level job. How are they supposed to get experience and become more responsible?
There are a ton of jobs at minimum wage! There is no shortage of them. You can literally find minimum wage jobs in retailing, fast food restaurants, factories, etc. I really don't think young people are out of jobs because of it. Perhaps this may be true for rural areas (with fewer potential employers) but in municipal areas, minimum wage jobs are plenty.
In any case, there is no such thing as a career. Maybe you have a career but most of the lower class people don't. If you think some people don't work minimum wage for most of their lives, you probably live in a world without any knowledge of what goes on around you. Just look around and you'll see what I mean. There are adults in minimum wage jobs such as fast food restaurants, cleaners, waiters in restaurants, factory work, taxicabs, certain sales, "homeworkers", lifting and moving, and so forth. These jobs are carried out by adults--not some students who live with their parents. You live in a parellel world not conscious of such situations. There are actually people who make around $15k to $25k per year even though they work 40 hours. These people are called the working poor. You might want to look it up.
Instead, young people can't find a low-responsibility, low-pay job. So, they just don't work. Then, when they're expected to be independent, they have no job experience at all, they just have a High School degree, which is worth about as much as the paper it's printed on (as far as representing knowledge and responsibility).
I just love the arguments coming out of capitalists these days (yes, you are one:( ). THe problem I have with your argument is this: capitalists justify compensation based on skill sets. There are a whole slew of UNSKILLED jobs with very low pay. If the job is unskilled, why do you care about past experience? Past experience in most of these cases is totally irrelelant to the job anyway (eg. a packager now applying for transportation). Knowlege and responsibility is totally irrelevant in these cases.
Most fascists are capitalists, with a few socialist ideals thrown in for good measure. One just needs to look at Nazi Germany or Italian Fascism (circa mid 1900's). Germany, for instance, was driven by private entrepreneurs and capitalists (ever saw Schindler's List? You think he could have been successful* in a non-capitalist society).
The only difference between a country like USA and (Nazi) Germany was the following. USA is democratic and largely supports equality. Germany was not too democratic and did not support equality. Germany, like all fascist societies, was a hierarchial society with "Aryans" at the top. HOWEVER, IF you were "Aryan", you would see little difference (in capitalism) between USA and Germany. Scholars (read: capitalists) have remarked how Germany (circa 1940's) was VERY open and free (in terms of economics). It was a great time for (capitalist) entrepreneurs.
(* Strictly speaking, Schindler was not successful. BUT he definitely was wealthy. It can also be argued that he failed purposely to save the Jews).
I don't think China is losing jobs due to lack of investment. Instead, my opinion is that it is losing jobs due to restructuring of the socialist-like economy. There is very high unemployment in the interior (you never hear of from the Western media) because formerly government-owned nationalist "crown corporations" are shutting down.
If you go with a socialist view, like mine, the only way to do that is to eliminate render the capitalist class obsolete. A way to do that is for employees to become employers. That is to say, every worker will be the owner of the company.
But there is a problem. Capitalism is an elitist system where a few hoarde huge wealth. This essentially means that the majority of the people will only own a minority of the wealth (and consequently the corporations). More Americans, for example, own companies than ever (if you count people investing in stock markets and employee share ownership plans), but unfortunately they only own a fraction.
To recap, the ideal solution is for employees to be employers (i.e. employees own the company). But that seems to have little impact under an elitist system like capitalism. So I'm not really sure hot to accomplish what is required...
People have the right to strike (in many countries) because society (mostly the working people) are of the opinion that workers need power to battle the employers. That is the reason why the right to strike was instituted. People didn't have such right in the 1800's or even early 1900's. So to sum up, it's just a right enshrined to give power to workers (who are often weak because they don't have capital--most important thing under capitalism) to defend themselves against employers (who do have capital). If you don't understand any of it, just read a bit on history and the worker movements from early 1900's to mid 1900's. The right to strike was developed during that time period.
Capitalism has no such thing as underpaid (or overpaid). Capitalists would do anything to drive wages as low as possible. Things like outsourcing are primarily done for such reasons.
Of course, I don't expect a libertarian-conservative like you to accept my view.
The union doesn't benefit from the destruction of the employer.
Workers don't benefit from destroying the employer but in some cases they do. For instance, if an employer has lower standards or wages than what one would expect in a particular society, workers won't lose much if such businesses go out of business. This is why labour supports minimum wage, even though it puts many companies out of business. It is much better for these low-wage companies to go out of business than to have them pay something very low.
.NET probably isn't that hard to pick up. Its main languages are basically derived from existing languages (like C++ and VB). A programmer in an object-oriented language (like C++) can just as easily pick up.NET as Java. In any case, businesses don't care about languages; they care about what is best for their client. If.NET is thought to be better than Java then they will surely go that route.
I think.NET will dominate because it seems to have better performance and features. I don't work in this field but Java always had problems with GUI stuff, or anything client related. With.NET, I imagine web apps will be much better than Java. In addition, Microsoft is backing.NET (obviously doh!:) ). This means powerful marketing and sales behind it. Sun isn't in the same league when it comes to influencing decision makers in large enterprises.
Finally, MS has a better IDE than Java (although I haven't worked with Java in years so maybe it's different now). One of the reason MS dominates programming is because of its IDE, namely MS Visual Studio. Linux, Unix, and Solaris just don't have such a productive environment. This is also why I think C# will become very popular, even though it is a proprietary language limited to specific systems (as opposed to things like C++, Java, etc which are open).
Large corporations will erect barriers to entry. It will not be easy for small companies to enter or to survive. Typical barriers to entry taught in business schools include patents, vertical integration, signing exclusive contracts, locking up customers (eg. airmiles, proprietary file formats), among others. It will be difficult for small companies to succeed. Furthermore, large companies automatically have larger clout, and, perhaps more importantly, economies of scale. The existence of economies of scale pretty much means that large companies will always beat new entrants. For example, it is very difficult to enter markets such as electronics, retailing, and auto/cars. You can probably say the same thing about computer operating systems, CPU manufacturing, and others--although the computer industry is not very mature so it is easier.
Some of the small fry get bought out, and some grow hugely and become Big Boys themselves. From time to time one of the Big Boys dies off. But the bigger the Big Boys are, the more room there is around them for fresh ideas that they won't adopt.
Overall this makes little difference. One big corporation is replaced by another. YOU might become rich and powerful but that's irrelevant. From the viewpoint of the economy, it's pretty much the same. That is to say, a few large companies controlling everything. So you will still have oligopolies and monopolies.
There is probably a steady state, but it almost never is monopoly and it almost never eliminates all possibility of newcomers.
I'm not implying that everything will tend to monopolies. That's why I say oligopolies and monopolies. The point is that there will be a FEW companies controlling most of the industry. In some cases it will be monopolies while for most, it would be oligopolies. I am also not saying that the SAME companies will remain in power or that there is zero possibility of entry into a market. Clearly, there is ALWAYS the possibility of entering any market (the only way this won't be true is if entering a market is outlawed eg. military weapons.) But the key thing is, a few companies will rule each industry. So, I don't expect Microsoft, IBM, and Intel to dominate the "computer*" industry in 50 years. However, I DO expect perhaps 2 or 3 large corporations to dominate the "computer" industry in 50 years.
Sivaram Velauthapillai
NOTE:
* What we call "computers" may not exist in 50 years. That's why I put computers in brackets. I'm basically referring to something similar. Perhaps computers will be replaced with quasi-biological machines.
Are you sure you meant to say 'azimuth'? That makes no sense. Anyway...
I don't share your view that there will be some "peak" in monpolization (what you call consolidation) followed by a decline. Corporations are more powerful now than ever! The few large ones control more wealth and have greater influence than at any point in the past. This goes for all industries. There are less airplane companies now than ever (Boeing and Airbus primarily); there are less car companies now than ever (many of them merged recently); there are less media companies now than ever (something like 11 companies control 90% of US media); there are fewers movie studios now than before (many with different names are owned by the same company eg. Disney vs Touchstone); there are less retailers now than ever; less oil companies; and so on.
I don't know what capitalist forces (aka free market forces) will break these things up. Do you really forsee a decline in the monopolization of media? Or cars?
A great time to be starting into a venture on the small independent scale for any technology, music , media or whatever, you will surely catch the next big up that comes as the dominos start to fall.
When do you expect the oligopolies I mentioned to fall?
True but... as any business course would say, large corporations' goal (at that point) is to establish barriers to entry. If the corporation knows what it is doing, these barriers cannot be overcome by new entrants. Examples of barriers include patents, economies of scale, locking up suppliers, etc.
The niche markets that you are talking about (I'm assuming that's what you are referring to with the profitable markets for small companies) is too small for it to matter. Yes, small companies can capture these markets. But they are very small.
For instance, I don't think Microsoft will be dislodged by anyone in the near future. The only ways they will go down is if they make some strategic mistake (some large companies do), or if they face oblescence. To give a more general example, I don't think any company can enter the car market sucessfully. The car companies that you see now will dominate (even more so in the future.) However, cars will become obsolete one day so they will face problems at that time.
This is nothing more than a move by IBM against Microsoft. It's all about positioning, as far as I can tell. IBM realizes that.NET is going to be huge in the future. The main competition to.NET is Java and if Java can be improved it might actually compete well against MS's.NET.
The question is whether Sun will buy into this. There are some advantages to Sun but there are also some disadvantages. One immediate advantage to Sun is that IBM push into the enterprise environment can help Java tremendously.
I'm going to get flamed for saying this but, if the status quo is retained, I think.NET will vaporize Java out of existence. I neither work with Java nor.NET (this isn't even my area) but I don't see many reasons why a neutral like me would pick Java over.NET these days.
I have this theory that free markets lead to oligopolies and monopolies under capitalism. Admittedly, this is an anti-capitalist view and capitalists don't accept it. All I can say is that your faith in the free market is misplaced.
You say that these companies have to play the "game of supply and demand." Well, they have always played that game. It's just that they gained power over time and skew the market in their favour. It is my opinion that you can't do anything to combat that under capitalism, unless you implement anti-capitalist measures (eg. anti-trust regulations, taxes, etc). All the so-called "evil" large corporations started out small, often under perfect competition. People like you pick on Microsoft, for example, but 20 years ago it was a small company that was playing the "game of supply and demand" as you desire. What happened?
The fact of the matter is, under capitalism, the primary goal of a business is to monpolize the industry. This will always be true as long as the system is based on maximizing profits, which capitalism is.
Most of your arguments are weak. For example, the computer industry, with its heavy patent and protectionism of "intellectual property", has managed to drop prices more than the Ford that you cite. What does this say? Companies like Microsoft did not become monopolies by manipulating the government--they did it on their own. You were never forced to use Windows or DOS. You could have used UNIX or Apple (which was even more expensive). If you became locked into proprietary technologies, it is probably your fault.
As far as content based industries are concerned, I don't see you providing any solutions. You download your music. OK. Fine. How exactly is this contributing to the artists? If everyone did this, the industry will collapse.
I don't see what you are doing to help this world progress into something better. You are just supporting the existing system of capitalism, with a small twist. Nothing will change.
On a side note, I have always wondered why the 5 or 6 largest ISPs never tried to build a true cartel (aside from the law).
According to my view of capitalism, free markets lead to oligopolies and monopolies--at least that's my theory. So the day WILL come when only a few ISPs are left. The reason it hasn't happened now is because there are too many ISPs. That is to say, the market is pretty much what one would call perfect competition. There are far more than 5 or 6 ISPs. You can't collude under perfect competition so that's why it hasn't happened. But in a few years I expect a few ISPs to kill the rest of the competition and dominate (like in most mature industries.) At that point, you'll see collusion.
People have been calling for the internet, among other things, to be in the hands of the private sector. What have these people to say now? What we are seeing is simply one issue with for-profit corporations running things. What VeriSign is doing is almost inevitable. I am assuming that they have run out of ways to generate more profits. The SiteFinder service was the right cash cow that they needed. Whether they win or lose, there will be other issues like this popping out.
It is my opinion that domain names (all of them, not just most) should be in the hands of the public, preferably academia* instead of government organizations.
Sivaram Velauthapillai
NOTES:
* Why Academia instead of government? Because they less corrupt and harder to corrupt, along with the fact that they are not profit-maximizers. Technically, the government controls universities. BUT historically, governments have only had indirect control, due to the long-standing norms in education.
As with all things, it's a scale. I'd argue that it's fairly hard to attack China with an Aegis system though, unless you want to fry them a dozen at a time. Ditto Patriot and other systems bought.
USA probably sells more jets (in dollar value) than the these so-called defensive systems. The same jets can be used to attack China (or any other country). Even the AEGIS system is somewhat offensive. It will be used to prevent submarines from attacking ships. It will probably be more useful when you are attacking another country than defending one.
'Suitcase nuke' in Jerusalem [where better to hit at the 'Zionist crusaders'?]
Tel Aviv hits Mecca + Medina [This one's a bit of a stretch, but I'd imagine the plans exist]
Islamabad hits Tel Aviv
It all goes downhill from here...
The muslim fundamentalists won't bomb Jerusalem since it is holy to muslims (and there are probably more Palestinians there than "Isrealis.")... As well, Pakistan probably doesn't have missiles that can hit Isreal (their missiles don't even cover all of India, for example). In any case, these are minor points.
If you are an Isreal (or anywhere in the Middle East), you have a point. I was thinking from a global point of view. I'm thinking more a World War III (this won't happen under that scenario).
I don't think you realize this but 'resource' is even more degrading than 'ant':( At least ants are animals while 'resource' is an abstract non-living thing. You can throw away a resource more so than a living thing. From my perspective, I would rather be called an ant than a resource--then again, I'm different from others:)
The reason I equate workers with ants is because that's how we seem to be. If you looked at us from outer space (say you were an alien), we would seem like ants. We work more than we relax.* We are scurrying around for most of our productive time (daytime) and then rest during the night. Rinse and repeat. We are doing nothing more than building an ant colony.
Of course, like all analogies or metaphors, the comparison doesn't hold up at all times. For instance, we don't really have a queen that benefits. Although, I suppose if we were practicing monarchy (like we were for most of human history), it would be correct (under capitalism, replace queen with capitalists.)
Sivaram Velauthapillai
FOOT NOTE:
* A typical person works 8 hours a day in the best countries (let's not get into the poor countries.) To accomplish this work, you typically spend one to two hours a day commuting (at least in cities.) If you work 9-5, by the time you come home it is probably around 6. Add another few hours a day for cooking and eating. The only free time you have is between, say, 7 and 11. This is only 4 hours. This pretty much means that we work more than we relax. (NOTE: I'm ignoring weekends, and I'm ignoring professionals who might actually work more.)
You have a point: I have no proof. But then again, there isn't any proof for the counter-argument either. This pretty much means that we can only speculate. And needless to say, I choose to go with the theory that EA brought down Westwood. You might go why I pick that argument? Well, it's from my observation that large corporations that take over smaller ones generally weaken the small ones when the profits aren't as much as they want. Another example of this is Blizzard. Blizzard is going down because of meddling from the parent corporation (prior to the 90's, the parent corporation left Blizzard alone.)
As I understand the situation, Taiwan is being excruciatingly polite about the whole affair. They acknowledge their limited independence, and would probably consider being ruled under a similar "one nation, two systems" regime as Hong Kong.
Yes, Taiwan is being very polite. I think it's because they know China will invade them if they declare independence. I'm sure they would want a totally independent country--who doesn't?
I'm not really sure if Taiwan wants the 'one nation, two systems.' I am also not sure if that really works. Hong Kong is being forced to change. In the long term, I see the following. China will switch from totalitarianism to some democracy-like system. China will become powerful and wealthy. Taiwan will merge with China and end up as one country. If China becomes a big economic power, Taiwan will likely want to join China.
So, overall, I think Taiwan will end up with China--hopefully, peacefully.
All they want *is* a limited independence, and note that almost entirely the hardware sold to Taiwan by the US is defensive.
There is no such thing as "defensive" hardware. Ever since governments changed their name from war department to defense department (circa mid 1900's), the whole notion of "defense" became meaningless. The "defensive" that Taiwan has can be used to bomb China. Conversely, the "defensive" ships China uses to patrol can be used to attack Taiwanese cities. As far as I'm concerned, defense is nothing more than doublespeak!
But that's a whole other can of worms (albeit also one in my personal top-three-reasons-we'll-all-vaporise-one-day list)
Don't be so pessimistic about the Middle East situation:) There are other more probable vaporize-everything scenarios:( I don't really think the Isreali/Palestinian conflict will lead to a nuclear war. Even if there are nuclear bombs being unleashed, they will be isolated and won't really do much damage (I'm talking about dirty bombs.)
True but the final nail was when Garriot left. I didn't play all the Ultimas so I don't cherish the earlier ones as much as perhaps you would. I think Ultima VII is ok (are you sure you are talking about VII? Or do you mean VIII? Or perhaps the last one, IX? VII wasn't that arcadish compared to the ones after it.)
Perhaps it was all due to the changing customer base. For instance, flight simulation/action games (eg. Wing Commander) were declining and no one was buying them. Maybe that resulted in less money being spent, which further reduced quality and so forth. It's hard to say.
Whatever the cause, the final symbolic move was when Garriot left.
Capitalism is an individualistic system. Many capitalists are social Darwinists (i.e. who believe the markets should dictate everything and the best should survive (similar to how social Darwinists believe in "survival of the fittest")).
Within that context (of capitalism), employees are not humans. Instead, it is more appropriate to call them worker-consumer ants. You are just building the colony for someone. You are quite replaceable. You are nothing! If you can't work as wanted by the capitalists, you deserve to die. That's capitalism for you.
If you want to be happy, live like an ant. Pretending you are human will actually depress you more than anything...
Origin died when Garriot was forced out. That was pretty much the end of it IMO. Their Ultima Online was kept going but nothing new really came out of EA.
Branding under one name, such as EA, is very attractive to corporations. Having "subsidiaries" with their own creative control is a big no-no for corporations. EA also pretty much ran Westwood Studios (famous for Dune, and C&C) down to the ground as well.
Origin may have died...but Ultima and Wing Commander will live on in our memories:)
The libertarian-conservative types and the conservatives (who are mostly capitalists) will view this as a bad thing but has anyone considered the fact that 911 might be important? There are good reason for having socialist ideals and government intervention. Emergency services are important. Sure, you might never use it but when you do, it is extremely important.
As far as the costs being passed on to consumers, that's fine. Consumers are the ones that benefit from it.
Slashdot Mirror
I think minimum wage may not apply to hiring kids to build a fence (I'm not 100% sure). I know for a fact that certain jobs (eg. newspaper deliveries, canvassing, etc) are below the minimum wage.
:( ). THe problem I have with your argument is this: capitalists justify compensation based on skill sets. There are a whole slew of UNSKILLED jobs with very low pay. If the job is unskilled, why do you care about past experience? Past experience in most of these cases is totally irrelelant to the job anyway (eg. a packager now applying for transportation). Knowlege and responsibility is totally irrelevant in these cases.
The thing about minimum wage is that you're assuming that it's a career position, when in truth it's often a passing job on the way to bigger and better things. It's not good when young people have no opportunity to work a low-level job. How are they supposed to get experience and become more responsible?
There are a ton of jobs at minimum wage! There is no shortage of them. You can literally find minimum wage jobs in retailing, fast food restaurants, factories, etc. I really don't think young people are out of jobs because of it. Perhaps this may be true for rural areas (with fewer potential employers) but in municipal areas, minimum wage jobs are plenty.
In any case, there is no such thing as a career. Maybe you have a career but most of the lower class people don't. If you think some people don't work minimum wage for most of their lives, you probably live in a world without any knowledge of what goes on around you. Just look around and you'll see what I mean. There are adults in minimum wage jobs such as fast food restaurants, cleaners, waiters in restaurants, factory work, taxicabs, certain sales, "homeworkers", lifting and moving, and so forth. These jobs are carried out by adults--not some students who live with their parents. You live in a parellel world not conscious of such situations. There are actually people who make around $15k to $25k per year even though they work 40 hours. These people are called the working poor. You might want to look it up.
Instead, young people can't find a low-responsibility, low-pay job. So, they just don't work. Then, when they're expected to be independent, they have no job experience at all, they just have a High School degree, which is worth about as much as the paper it's printed on (as far as representing knowledge and responsibility).
I just love the arguments coming out of capitalists these days (yes, you are one
Sivaram Velauthapillai
Most fascists are capitalists, with a few socialist ideals thrown in for good measure. One just needs to look at Nazi Germany or Italian Fascism (circa mid 1900's). Germany, for instance, was driven by private entrepreneurs and capitalists (ever saw Schindler's List? You think he could have been successful* in a non-capitalist society).
The only difference between a country like USA and (Nazi) Germany was the following. USA is democratic and largely supports equality. Germany was not too democratic and did not support equality. Germany, like all fascist societies, was a hierarchial society with "Aryans" at the top. HOWEVER, IF you were "Aryan", you would see little difference (in capitalism) between USA and Germany. Scholars (read: capitalists) have remarked how Germany (circa 1940's) was VERY open and free (in terms of economics). It was a great time for (capitalist) entrepreneurs.
(* Strictly speaking, Schindler was not successful. BUT he definitely was wealthy. It can also be argued that he failed purposely to save the Jews).
Sivaram Velauthapillai
I don't think China is losing jobs due to lack of investment. Instead, my opinion is that it is losing jobs due to restructuring of the socialist-like economy. There is very high unemployment in the interior (you never hear of from the Western media) because formerly government-owned nationalist "crown corporations" are shutting down.
Sivaram Velauthapillai
If you go with a socialist view, like mine, the only way to do that is to eliminate render the capitalist class obsolete. A way to do that is for employees to become employers. That is to say, every worker will be the owner of the company.
But there is a problem. Capitalism is an elitist system where a few hoarde huge wealth. This essentially means that the majority of the people will only own a minority of the wealth (and consequently the corporations). More Americans, for example, own companies than ever (if you count people investing in stock markets and employee share ownership plans), but unfortunately they only own a fraction.
To recap, the ideal solution is for employees to be employers (i.e. employees own the company). But that seems to have little impact under an elitist system like capitalism. So I'm not really sure hot to accomplish what is required...
Sivaram Velauthapillai
People have the right to strike (in many countries) because society (mostly the working people) are of the opinion that workers need power to battle the employers. That is the reason why the right to strike was instituted. People didn't have such right in the 1800's or even early 1900's. So to sum up, it's just a right enshrined to give power to workers (who are often weak because they don't have capital--most important thing under capitalism) to defend themselves against employers (who do have capital). If you don't understand any of it, just read a bit on history and the worker movements from early 1900's to mid 1900's. The right to strike was developed during that time period.
Sivaram Velauthapillai
Capitalism has no such thing as underpaid (or overpaid). Capitalists would do anything to drive wages as low as possible. Things like outsourcing are primarily done for such reasons.
Of course, I don't expect a libertarian-conservative like you to accept my view.
Sivaram Velauthapillai
The union doesn't benefit from the destruction of the employer.
Workers don't benefit from destroying the employer but in some cases they do. For instance, if an employer has lower standards or wages than what one would expect in a particular society, workers won't lose much if such businesses go out of business. This is why labour supports minimum wage, even though it puts many companies out of business. It is much better for these low-wage companies to go out of business than to have them pay something very low.
Sivaram Velauthapillai
There are plenty of hard working people who will take the job.
A typo in your message. I think you meant to say:
There are plenty of exploited working people who will take the job.
Sivaram Velauthapillai
.NET probably isn't that hard to pick up. Its main languages are basically derived from existing languages (like C++ and VB). A programmer in an object-oriented language (like C++) can just as easily pick up .NET as Java. In any case, businesses don't care about languages; they care about what is best for their client. If .NET is thought to be better than Java then they will surely go that route.
.NET will dominate because it seems to have better performance and features. I don't work in this field but Java always had problems with GUI stuff, or anything client related. With .NET, I imagine web apps will be much better than Java. In addition, Microsoft is backing .NET (obviously doh! :) ). This means powerful marketing and sales behind it. Sun isn't in the same league when it comes to influencing decision makers in large enterprises.
I think
Finally, MS has a better IDE than Java (although I haven't worked with Java in years so maybe it's different now). One of the reason MS dominates programming is because of its IDE, namely MS Visual Studio. Linux, Unix, and Solaris just don't have such a productive environment. This is also why I think C# will become very popular, even though it is a proprietary language limited to specific systems (as opposed to things like C++, Java, etc which are open).
Sivaram Velauthapillai
Couple of points...
Large corporations will erect barriers to entry. It will not be easy for small companies to enter or to survive. Typical barriers to entry taught in business schools include patents, vertical integration, signing exclusive contracts, locking up customers (eg. airmiles, proprietary file formats), among others. It will be difficult for small companies to succeed. Furthermore, large companies automatically have larger clout, and, perhaps more importantly, economies of scale. The existence of economies of scale pretty much means that large companies will always beat new entrants. For example, it is very difficult to enter markets such as electronics, retailing, and auto/cars. You can probably say the same thing about computer operating systems, CPU manufacturing, and others--although the computer industry is not very mature so it is easier.
Some of the small fry get bought out, and some grow hugely and become Big Boys themselves. From time to time one of the Big Boys dies off. But the bigger the Big Boys are, the more room there is around them for fresh ideas that they won't adopt.
Overall this makes little difference. One big corporation is replaced by another. YOU might become rich and powerful but that's irrelevant. From the viewpoint of the economy, it's pretty much the same. That is to say, a few large companies controlling everything. So you will still have oligopolies and monopolies.
There is probably a steady state, but it almost never is monopoly and it almost never eliminates all possibility of newcomers.
I'm not implying that everything will tend to monopolies. That's why I say oligopolies and monopolies. The point is that there will be a FEW companies controlling most of the industry. In some cases it will be monopolies while for most, it would be oligopolies. I am also not saying that the SAME companies will remain in power or that there is zero possibility of entry into a market. Clearly, there is ALWAYS the possibility of entering any market (the only way this won't be true is if entering a market is outlawed eg. military weapons.) But the key thing is, a few companies will rule each industry. So, I don't expect Microsoft, IBM, and Intel to dominate the "computer*" industry in 50 years. However, I DO expect perhaps 2 or 3 large corporations to dominate the "computer" industry in 50 years.
Sivaram Velauthapillai
NOTE:
* What we call "computers" may not exist in 50 years. That's why I put computers in brackets. I'm basically referring to something similar. Perhaps computers will be replaced with quasi-biological machines.
Are you sure you meant to say 'azimuth'? That makes no sense. Anyway...
I don't share your view that there will be some "peak" in monpolization (what you call consolidation) followed by a decline. Corporations are more powerful now than ever! The few large ones control more wealth and have greater influence than at any point in the past. This goes for all industries. There are less airplane companies now than ever (Boeing and Airbus primarily); there are less car companies now than ever (many of them merged recently); there are less media companies now than ever (something like 11 companies control 90% of US media); there are fewers movie studios now than before (many with different names are owned by the same company eg. Disney vs Touchstone); there are less retailers now than ever; less oil companies; and so on.
I don't know what capitalist forces (aka free market forces) will break these things up. Do you really forsee a decline in the monopolization of media? Or cars?
A great time to be starting into a venture on the small independent scale for any technology, music , media or whatever, you will surely catch the next big up that comes as the dominos start to fall.
When do you expect the oligopolies I mentioned to fall?
Sivaram Velauthapillai
True but... as any business course would say, large corporations' goal (at that point) is to establish barriers to entry. If the corporation knows what it is doing, these barriers cannot be overcome by new entrants. Examples of barriers include patents, economies of scale, locking up suppliers, etc.
The niche markets that you are talking about (I'm assuming that's what you are referring to with the profitable markets for small companies) is too small for it to matter. Yes, small companies can capture these markets. But they are very small.
For instance, I don't think Microsoft will be dislodged by anyone in the near future. The only ways they will go down is if they make some strategic mistake (some large companies do), or if they face oblescence. To give a more general example, I don't think any company can enter the car market sucessfully. The car companies that you see now will dominate (even more so in the future.) However, cars will become obsolete one day so they will face problems at that time.
Sivaram Velauthapillai
This is nothing more than a move by IBM against Microsoft. It's all about positioning, as far as I can tell. IBM realizes that .NET is going to be huge in the future. The main competition to .NET is Java and if Java can be improved it might actually compete well against MS's .NET.
.NET will vaporize Java out of existence. I neither work with Java nor .NET (this isn't even my area) but I don't see many reasons why a neutral like me would pick Java over .NET these days.
The question is whether Sun will buy into this. There are some advantages to Sun but there are also some disadvantages. One immediate advantage to Sun is that IBM push into the enterprise environment can help Java tremendously.
I'm going to get flamed for saying this but, if the status quo is retained, I think
Sivaram Velauthapillai
I have this theory that free markets lead to oligopolies and monopolies under capitalism. Admittedly, this is an anti-capitalist view and capitalists don't accept it. All I can say is that your faith in the free market is misplaced.
You say that these companies have to play the "game of supply and demand." Well, they have always played that game. It's just that they gained power over time and skew the market in their favour. It is my opinion that you can't do anything to combat that under capitalism, unless you implement anti-capitalist measures (eg. anti-trust regulations, taxes, etc). All the so-called "evil" large corporations started out small, often under perfect competition. People like you pick on Microsoft, for example, but 20 years ago it was a small company that was playing the "game of supply and demand" as you desire. What happened?
The fact of the matter is, under capitalism, the primary goal of a business is to monpolize the industry. This will always be true as long as the system is based on maximizing profits, which capitalism is.
Most of your arguments are weak. For example, the computer industry, with its heavy patent and protectionism of "intellectual property", has managed to drop prices more than the Ford that you cite. What does this say? Companies like Microsoft did not become monopolies by manipulating the government--they did it on their own. You were never forced to use Windows or DOS. You could have used UNIX or Apple (which was even more expensive). If you became locked into proprietary technologies, it is probably your fault.
As far as content based industries are concerned, I don't see you providing any solutions. You download your music. OK. Fine. How exactly is this contributing to the artists? If everyone did this, the industry will collapse.
I don't see what you are doing to help this world progress into something better. You are just supporting the existing system of capitalism, with a small twist. Nothing will change.
Sivaram Velauthapillai
On a side note, I have always wondered why the 5 or 6 largest ISPs never tried to build a true cartel (aside from the law).
According to my view of capitalism, free markets lead to oligopolies and monopolies--at least that's my theory. So the day WILL come when only a few ISPs are left. The reason it hasn't happened now is because there are too many ISPs. That is to say, the market is pretty much what one would call perfect competition. There are far more than 5 or 6 ISPs. You can't collude under perfect competition so that's why it hasn't happened. But in a few years I expect a few ISPs to kill the rest of the competition and dominate (like in most mature industries.) At that point, you'll see collusion.
Sivaram Velauthapillai
lol funny quote... I like your sig :)
Sivaram Velauthapillai
People have been calling for the internet, among other things, to be in the hands of the private sector. What have these people to say now? What we are seeing is simply one issue with for-profit corporations running things. What VeriSign is doing is almost inevitable. I am assuming that they have run out of ways to generate more profits. The SiteFinder service was the right cash cow that they needed. Whether they win or lose, there will be other issues like this popping out.
It is my opinion that domain names (all of them, not just most) should be in the hands of the public, preferably academia* instead of government organizations.
Sivaram Velauthapillai NOTES:
* Why Academia instead of government? Because they less corrupt and harder to corrupt, along with the fact that they are not profit-maximizers. Technically, the government controls universities. BUT historically, governments have only had indirect control, due to the long-standing norms in education.
As with all things, it's a scale. I'd argue that it's fairly hard to attack China with an Aegis system though, unless you want to fry them a dozen at a time. Ditto Patriot and other systems bought.
USA probably sells more jets (in dollar value) than the these so-called defensive systems. The same jets can be used to attack China (or any other country). Even the AEGIS system is somewhat offensive. It will be used to prevent submarines from attacking ships. It will probably be more useful when you are attacking another country than defending one.
'Suitcase nuke' in Jerusalem [where better to hit at the 'Zionist crusaders'?] Tel Aviv hits Mecca + Medina [This one's a bit of a stretch, but I'd imagine the plans exist] Islamabad hits Tel Aviv It all goes downhill from here...
The muslim fundamentalists won't bomb Jerusalem since it is holy to muslims (and there are probably more Palestinians there than "Isrealis.")... As well, Pakistan probably doesn't have missiles that can hit Isreal (their missiles don't even cover all of India, for example). In any case, these are minor points.
If you are an Isreal (or anywhere in the Middle East), you have a point. I was thinking from a global point of view. I'm thinking more a World War III (this won't happen under that scenario).
Sivaram Velauthapillai
I don't think you realize this but 'resource' is even more degrading than 'ant' :( At least ants are animals while 'resource' is an abstract non-living thing. You can throw away a resource more so than a living thing. From my perspective, I would rather be called an ant than a resource--then again, I'm different from others :)
The reason I equate workers with ants is because that's how we seem to be. If you looked at us from outer space (say you were an alien), we would seem like ants. We work more than we relax.* We are scurrying around for most of our productive time (daytime) and then rest during the night. Rinse and repeat. We are doing nothing more than building an ant colony.
Of course, like all analogies or metaphors, the comparison doesn't hold up at all times. For instance, we don't really have a queen that benefits. Although, I suppose if we were practicing monarchy (like we were for most of human history), it would be correct (under capitalism, replace queen with capitalists.)
Sivaram Velauthapillai FOOT NOTE:
* A typical person works 8 hours a day in the best countries (let's not get into the poor countries.) To accomplish this work, you typically spend one to two hours a day commuting (at least in cities.) If you work 9-5, by the time you come home it is probably around 6. Add another few hours a day for cooking and eating. The only free time you have is between, say, 7 and 11. This is only 4 hours. This pretty much means that we work more than we relax. (NOTE: I'm ignoring weekends, and I'm ignoring professionals who might actually work more.)
You have a point: I have no proof. But then again, there isn't any proof for the counter-argument either. This pretty much means that we can only speculate. And needless to say, I choose to go with the theory that EA brought down Westwood. You might go why I pick that argument? Well, it's from my observation that large corporations that take over smaller ones generally weaken the small ones when the profits aren't as much as they want. Another example of this is Blizzard. Blizzard is going down because of meddling from the parent corporation (prior to the 90's, the parent corporation left Blizzard alone.)
Sivaram Velauthapillai
As I understand the situation, Taiwan is being excruciatingly polite about the whole affair. They acknowledge their limited independence, and would probably consider being ruled under a similar "one nation, two systems" regime as Hong Kong.
:) There are other more probable vaporize-everything scenarios :( I don't really think the Isreali/Palestinian conflict will lead to a nuclear war. Even if there are nuclear bombs being unleashed, they will be isolated and won't really do much damage (I'm talking about dirty bombs.)
Yes, Taiwan is being very polite. I think it's because they know China will invade them if they declare independence. I'm sure they would want a totally independent country--who doesn't?
I'm not really sure if Taiwan wants the 'one nation, two systems.' I am also not sure if that really works. Hong Kong is being forced to change. In the long term, I see the following. China will switch from totalitarianism to some democracy-like system. China will become powerful and wealthy. Taiwan will merge with China and end up as one country. If China becomes a big economic power, Taiwan will likely want to join China.
So, overall, I think Taiwan will end up with China--hopefully, peacefully.
All they want *is* a limited independence, and note that almost entirely the hardware sold to Taiwan by the US is defensive.
There is no such thing as "defensive" hardware. Ever since governments changed their name from war department to defense department (circa mid 1900's), the whole notion of "defense" became meaningless. The "defensive" that Taiwan has can be used to bomb China. Conversely, the "defensive" ships China uses to patrol can be used to attack Taiwanese cities. As far as I'm concerned, defense is nothing more than doublespeak!
But that's a whole other can of worms (albeit also one in my personal top-three-reasons-we'll-all-vaporise-one-day list)
Don't be so pessimistic about the Middle East situation
Sivaram Velauthapillai
True but the final nail was when Garriot left. I didn't play all the Ultimas so I don't cherish the earlier ones as much as perhaps you would. I think Ultima VII is ok (are you sure you are talking about VII? Or do you mean VIII? Or perhaps the last one, IX? VII wasn't that arcadish compared to the ones after it.)
Perhaps it was all due to the changing customer base. For instance, flight simulation/action games (eg. Wing Commander) were declining and no one was buying them. Maybe that resulted in less money being spent, which further reduced quality and so forth. It's hard to say.
Whatever the cause, the final symbolic move was when Garriot left.
Sivaram Velauthapillai
Capitalism is an individualistic system. Many capitalists are social Darwinists (i.e. who believe the markets should dictate everything and the best should survive (similar to how social Darwinists believe in "survival of the fittest")).
Within that context (of capitalism), employees are not humans. Instead, it is more appropriate to call them worker-consumer ants. You are just building the colony for someone. You are quite replaceable. You are nothing! If you can't work as wanted by the capitalists, you deserve to die. That's capitalism for you.
If you want to be happy, live like an ant. Pretending you are human will actually depress you more than anything...
Ok, you don't have to follow that.
Sivaram Velauthapillai
Origin died when Garriot was forced out. That was pretty much the end of it IMO. Their Ultima Online was kept going but nothing new really came out of EA.
:)
Branding under one name, such as EA, is very attractive to corporations. Having "subsidiaries" with their own creative control is a big no-no for corporations. EA also pretty much ran Westwood Studios (famous for Dune, and C&C) down to the ground as well.
Origin may have died...but Ultima and Wing Commander will live on in our memories
Sivaram Velauthapillai
The libertarian-conservative types and the conservatives (who are mostly capitalists) will view this as a bad thing but has anyone considered the fact that 911 might be important? There are good reason for having socialist ideals and government intervention. Emergency services are important. Sure, you might never use it but when you do, it is extremely important.
As far as the costs being passed on to consumers, that's fine. Consumers are the ones that benefit from it.
Sivaram Velauthapillai